The All Progressives Congress (APC), has stated that former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, is not its member, adding that he is yet to join its fold.
The statement follows the calls by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for his sack.
The APC denied claims by the PDP that Dogara has defected to the party.
Recall that there had been reports last year that the ex-speaker, who was elected to the House of Representatives at the last general election on the platform of the PDP, had defected to the APC.
The party’s denial is contained in a counter-affidavit it filed in opposition to a suit by the PDP, asking Dogara to vacate his seat for allegedly abandoning unlawfully the party on whose platform he rode to the House of Reps.
Dare Oketade, the Head of the Legal Department of the APC, was quoted, in the party’s counter-affidavit, to have claimed that he is not aware that Dogara has defected from the PDP. Oketade said he has checked the membership register of the APC and he did not find Dogara’s name in APC’s membership register.
He said:
“In fact, the 5th defendant (the APC) has not received an application for membership from the first defendant (Dogara) or any other person acting under the instruction of the 1st defendant; neither the 5th defendant has issued any membership card to the 1st defendant.
“Recording the name of the 1st defendant as member of the 5th defendant in the membership register of the 5th defendant and the subsequent issuance of APC’s membership card to the 1st defendant confers 1st defendant the membership of the 5th defendant.”
APC described the suit by the PDP as speculative and instituted in bad faith, and prayed the court to dismiss all the claims of the plaintiffs in the interest of justice.
Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court, Abuja on Monday, January 18, granted the plaintiffs’ application for an abridgment of time within which the case could be heard.
At the resumed hearing of the suit on Monday, the lawyer to the plaintiffs, Jibril Jibril, urged the court to abridge the time for the hearing of the suit owing to the fact that Dogara is already enjoying legislative privileges as a member of the House of Representatives.
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